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May 18, 2010

G40: Red Sox 7, Yankees 6

During the bottom of the ninth inning, as Jonathan Papelbon weaved and bobbed and seemed to be slipping on the high wire, an old Richard Thompson song popped into my head. It was back in 1983 and he was singing about something other than baseball, but the line has stayed with me: "My heart was beating like a song by the Clash".

You wouldn't think that a game on May 18 could make a fan of an underachieving team solidly in fourth place and coming off its most demoralizing loss of the year feel like it was actually October 18 with the pennant hanging in the balance.

But with Randy Winn in the box with two outs and the tying run at third and winning run at second, in a game that I had emotionally tossed the metaphorical white towel in on after seven innings and a 5-1 Yankees lead, only to be utterly delighted and reawakened by the sight of Joba Chamberlain flat-brimming his way to allowing four Boston runs before recording a second out (though both outs were gifts, as Victor hacked on 3-0 and Ortiz literally walked to first watching his fly ball not leave the park), and then having Daniel Bard slam the door on Hideki Okajima's little two-out mess in the eighth and preserve the tie, and then watch the Sox rally for two more runs against Mariano Rivera, a key play of which was Marcus Thames dropping Marco Scutaro's pop-up in short right and literally kicking it into right-center, then Jeremy Hermida (who had replaced a possibly injured J.D. Drew after Drew had hit a key double against Joba), clearly looking at strike three on a 1-2 pitch inside, which would have ended the inning with the game 5-5, but for some reason not having the plate umpire ring him up, whacking a two-run double far over Winn's head in left field, and then hoping Bard would return for the ninth, but no, it's Papelbon, yikes, and Slappy reaches as his ground ball lazily rolls past Scutaro's back-handed glove into left, Cano doubles, it's now 7-6, Cano is sac'd to third and Thames walks (but not before ball 2 is up and not really that far in, but Thames backs away quickly anyway and glares out at Bot; a fight - now? in the rain?) and Pena runs for Thames at first and goes to second as Miranda smacks a hard, low snake to Papelbon, who twists and turns (seemingly in panic, though that was probably a bit of projection by me) before throwing to first, and so now Winn is up and the count is 2-1 and here's where my heart is thumping like it's the ALCS, Winn fouls off a pitch, takes ball three, full count, and if he walks, the bases will be loaded for Jeter, who hasn't done a thing all night, but it's still not a situation I would willingly ask for, and Winn fouls off another 3-2 pitch, and then suddenly, he swings and misses. And immediately, everything stops. It's actually slightly disorienting. Winn is out, it's the third out, the inning is over, and that means the Sox win the game. Jesus, can I take a breath now?

And it turns out that the Thompson line in "Tear-Stained Letter" is: "My head was beating like a song by the Clash". ... I like what I remembered much better.

I'm not sure two other games, without the added intensity of extra innings, could offer as much drama and tension as this little mid-May series did. The remaining 122 games of the regular season will unfold however they do, but after tonight, you should neither need nor demand any additional evidence of this Red Sox team refusal to quit. They will claw and scrape and battle to the very last out. (And shame on me for assuming this one was over.)

An impartial observer watching these two games would come away thinking baseball is the most amazing, exhilarating, action-packed, heart-stopping, emotionally-draining game ever devised. And, of course, she'd be right.

Start of game delayed by rain. 8 PM start expected.

Mike Lowell is very frustrated, says he has thought about asking for his release.

Lost amid the shitastic ending last night was some good hitting: Victor Martinez was 0-for-his-last-19 before he homered from both sides of the plate, the first time a Boston player has done that since Jason Varitek on August 16, 2005 (crazy linescore -- and it was the second start/game of Jonathan Papelbon's career).

David Ortiz, Kevin Youkilis, and J.D. Drew also went deep. Drew's dong was especially big, cutting New York's lead in the fifth from 6-2 to 6-5. That rally started after Phil Hughes retired the first two batters on only three pitches.

Emma and I were reviewing amazing pictures of Mount St. Helens while listening to a terrific song about it. Between the song that a friend of ours played on and going out to visit my folks in Washington and hiking on the Mt. it has meaning for her. The power the pictures show is just devastating.

BTW, in a slight glimmer of good political news in the US, the more progressive candidate, Joe Sestak, appears to have defeated Republican-No-Wait-I-Mean-Democrat senator Arlen Specter in the state's Democratic primary.

I've had a soft spot for the crispy one. Were that he just a bit more (good). As a name to play on and root for he was solid and he had a bit of a character...charging the mound, battles with mascots, some great layouts.

Since baseball is not exciting tonight - got good news/bad news today.Took Noah to the vet, not sure at all when I left that he would be coming home with me. He's had hip issues for a while, but this weekend they got very bad. He's dragging his back legs behind him most of the time. Bad news - probably a blown disc in back and he probably doesn't have a lot of quality time left. Good news - Vet feels like he can make him comfortable and able to walk for at least a few weeks, maybe months with steroids. Have used them before to try to help with the skin issues, but this time, given the prognosis, he said he would prescribe a much higher dosage. Said it would almost definitely make him feel better, but only for so long. So we have some time to hang out.And the Sox are showing signs of life!

Still around, just not motivated to thread tonight. Not sure if it's the game or just my general state of mind. I just hate making negative comments. As my mother said, if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything.

Noah is around 13, we're not 100% sure. I remember he was a Mother's Day present, so his "birthday" was recently. But none of us are sure about what year we got him for her. Fairly certain, though, that he's 12 or 13.

So get this. My father-in-law (who works with my husband) is a big Yankees fan. My husband says his dad spent about 10 minutes today talking about what a great game that was last night. How he had given up on them and turned it back on to see them win, etc. He spent 5 minutes on the greatness of a walk-off win. Jay says he seemed to have no thought that he could have been pissing off his son.

Anyway, I say if the Sox win this one, Jay can turn the tables. Talk about how it was 5-1 in the 8th, the brilliant JtC pitching, etc.

MrsG, imagine living with a Yankee fan... He is usually very good about not gloating, but last night as soon as Thames hit that HR, he jumped up and said, "Good! I am happy." He was pissed about Pap hitting whatshisname, the batter before Thames.